Page 5 of Chained to the Devil's Daughter

Black as the void and devoid of temperature, my magic raced to meet my call.

“Fucking elements.”

Annoyed, I urged more power forth. The black flames roared to life, hotter than anything I’d touched for three thousand two hundred and eighty-seven days.

“Fuck!”

I hissed and danced around, begging my magic to cease. It obeyed, eventually, and that strange feeling bubbled in my chest again. Elements, it was SO GOOD to laugh!

The first time an overseer pushed me too far, causing my magic to spill out as black vapor-like wisps along my fingertips, they’d replaced my suppressant with a girthier Forgotten Ones bone, its spikes longer and sharper. Without the implant, I’d expected my normal magic to return. Fuck it. Even with this void-dark, unruly magic, wild as it was, I would find her.

It took seventy-eight surreal steps into Ring Nine before a laborer screamed. Once the shriek pierced the air, my simple stroll got a lot more difficult. Wide eyes were framed by dirt-stained hands. Feet with rotting flesh stammered back, trying to run. I grimaced and held my bloody palms before me.

“Wait. I won’t hurt you.”

But my hands chose that moment to burst into black flames.

This wasn’t going to be a waltz through Hell to reach my woman. This was going to be a gods-damned bloodbath.

I smirked. I didn’t believe in gods, and Devil was just an opportunist.

The rings were a whopping five kilometers below the surface, the prime depth for excavating Forgotten Ones' bones. Without beating wings to carry me up to the bridge system that connected all ten rings, I would have to cross each 40-mile ring by foot. With the sand eating my every step and enemies in the skies, the 8-day trip to the inner rings could take ten or more. Assuming Devil’s devotees didn’t stop me first.

An overseer’s flames leaped toward me as if shot from a hose. A beast of pure instinct, I raised my arm to block thetorrent. Only a weak black shield materialized, and I lost one step backward into the sand.

The overseer laughed. More of his ilk appeared, dotting the sky. Those without wings would soon swarm down the bridges.

That’s right, fuckers. Come straight to me. As long as the unpredictable magic in my veins would fucking listen, I would. . .

“Burn! Fucking burn, motherfuckers!”

The first overseer succumbed to my odd flames, but their skin didn’t even burn. They simplypoofedaway in a cloud of ash. My jog faltered a halfstep. I stumbled over a body—not one of mine, a random laborer worked to death—and I studied my hands, my arms, alight in black.

Another enemy surged forward—another chance to study my new power.

The muscles in my legs fell into a numb pace. Dodging laborers and keeping sights toward the bridge far above, I discharged overseers and guards as the sun briefly graced each stripe of sky between the next cliff I raced towards and the ones I left behind.

Days passed. My muscles burned. I couldn’t imagine smelling anything but ash ever again. I needed food, and rest.

Through another gate, the sight of laborers thinned, replaced by skin sellers, haunted eyes wavy with intoxication. Ring Six. I barreled through any dismal establishments I came across, swiping food from tables as I tried and failed to keep pace, one thought keeping me on my feet.

Firefly.

After crossing into Ring Five, I coughed with every inhale. Bone dust permeated the air, and no one in sight was without a mask. Microscopic bone remnants pelted my skin as I ran.

I grew increasingly less lucid with every step.

Searra.

In Ring Four, I almost fell asleep on my feet, narrowly dodging smithy fires as workers forged weapons and tools of dark magic with ground-up bones of the Forgotten Ones.

Violins and the scent of salt-less meat. Ring Three.

Was it day or night? I saw nothing but black and gray.

Reduced to a primal state, there was no recognizable piece of me left. Maybe this was how Firefolk felt. Only one thought pumped my limbs, using my magic like a brainless animal.

Mate.

---